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Canistosta Disappoints
Canistosta, SD, August 2025 Kate read that Canistosta has a farmer’s market on Tuesdays from 5pm to 7 pm. We left a little early with plans to stop by the dam and get to Canistosta at 5pm. We checked the dam for the Belted Kingfisher, but it was not there. The hurt pelican was floating…
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Falls Park
Sioux Falls, SD, August 2025 Kate found out that there was a Farmer’s Market in Sioux Falls at Falls Park. We decided to kill several birds with one drive by going to the Farmer’s Market, touring Falls Park, and getting groceries all in the same trip. On the way out, we saw a Great (White)…
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Greenway Bike Trail
Sioux Falls, SD, August 2025 I started out the day watching the birds from the back window. We had quite the variety. Unfortunately, Mackie slept through it. Sioux Falls is about 30 miles from Lake Vermillion State Recreation Area and is the largest town in South Dakota. Throughout the town runs the Greenway Bike Trail.…
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Palisades State Park
Garretson, SD, August 2025 Today was supposed to be a reasonably nice day with sun and no rain. So, we decided to visit Palisades State Park in South Dakota which is about 45 minutes from our current campground. We set the car GPS and off we went. Needless to say, the car GPS took us…
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Waterfowl Game Production Area
Lake Vermillion Recreation Area, SD, August 2025 South Dakota has a lot of “Waterfowl Production Areas” that are managed by the South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Department. The website indicates that the Production areas have hiking. Based on what we saw, you can hike in the areas but there are no designated trails. I…
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Badlands National Park
Interior, SD, July 2025 Kate put together a plan to do everything within about 100 miles, except John ruined her plan by pointing out that her route bypassed most of the Badlands National Park. The revised plan skipped the extra grasslands visitor center, and passed through the badlands. This plan involved going to the Minuteman…
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Not Quite 20,000 Leagues Under the Ground
Wind Cave National Monument, SD, July 2025 It was closer to 500 feet. Actually, we have no idea on the length of a league. If a league is .025 feet, maybe it was 20,000 leagues. Probably not. We pre-purchased tickets for cave tours at Wind Cave National Monument. Originally, we planned for one at Wind…
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Needles Highway and Custer
Custer State Park & Custer City, SD, July 2025 Today started out with John inspecting the roof for potential tree damage. John wanted to do this before the upcoming rainfall since a small portion of the roof was scraped by trees when we were backing into the site. Fortunately, the roof looked good and did…
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Wildlife Visitor Center Custer State Park
Custer State Park, SD, July 2025 John would tell you that I have an obsession with 2 things. Post cards and cancel stamps. I did not collect my cancel stamp when we went to the visitor center at the entrance of the park because I was out of cancel stamp pages in my book. At…
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Jewel Cave National Monument & Canyon Hike
Jewel Cave National Monument, SD, July 2025 There are 3 national monuments within an hour of Custer State Park. The monuments are Jewel Cave National Monument, Wind Cave National Monument and Mount Rushmore National Monument. Jewel Cave has a .25 mile, 3.5 mile, and 5.5 mile hike near it. The .25 miles hike starts and…